It’s a New Year, it’s a New You! I am still feeling overly stuffed and sugared-out from all the festivities over the past month or so, how about you? And for some reason I can’t stop drinking champagne! This is not a huge problem to have I suppose but I’m fooling myself if I think replacing candy with champs is helping to make that bloated feeling go away. So when my friend and cycling teacher Nancy suggested we give up sugar for five days, I raised my hand (maybe a little bit too quick) and said, “I’m in.” Little did I know she meant no wine or champs but I guess I’ll still give it the old college try. Do you care to join?
Gosh there’s so much sugar in everything it’s hard to avoid it overall it seems unless you truly check all the labels if you’re not eating fresh, organic produce all day and all night. I’m not a rabbit and I for one could not survive on just greens and beans for five days. I may live in California but I am not that drastic, although there are many people here who are and are very proud of it. I actually enjoy eating and I probably spend too much time thinking about what I should cook next and creating recipes that involve lots of taste testing in the making, if you catch my drift. I’m lucky if there’s any cookies to share after I make a batch I am that greedy when I’m all alone!
Another think I really like to make are juices because you can never go wrong. Cut up a bunch of veggies and toss them in the blender and wallah! Here’s a few if you need any new concoction ideas. So I’ve been starting out the day with some kind of smoothie and today I decided to go green, in every sense of the word. I love getting green drinks at the local shops in town but they are expensive and the ingredients are so cheap! Why spend $5 on just one drink when you could get five drinks for that making them at home? I don’t have a fancy Vitamix, so I used my lovely blender to juice all this up! And I’m able to see exactly what’s in them unlike Jamba Juice which loads their juices with sugar, or so I’ve read… and tasted… too sweet for me! I call this the “Green Monstah” because I’m a Red Sox fan of course. Oh! And check out my new cutting board in the shape of Rhode Island, thanks to my step-brother!
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Green Monstah Juice- serves one or two
Ingredients:
-1/2 avocado
-4 celery sticks
-1/2 Granny Smith Apple
-1/2 cucumber
-handful cilantro
-1/2 cup water
Directions:
1. Chop the veggies and put everything in your blender! Enjoy this green, fresh and clean juice, under $5.00!
Yummers!
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Okay, onto books for a moment! I’ve just finished my first book of the New Year, Donna Tartt’s The Secret History. I have a feeling this may be the best book I read all year. If you haven’t read this already, do yourself a favor and call your local library and reserve it today! This book truly is enthralling and suspenseful even though you think you know how the book is going to end. Her writing is so descriptive and I am surprised I like it this much because I read The Goldfinch, the book that got so much hype last year, and I didn’t think it was that amazing but this book, IS!
I plan to read her book The Little Friend soon!
Before I sign off today, I want to thank all who weighed in and commented on my last post about people “doing their own thing” in yoga. The post got a tremendous amount of views that day, 250 to be exact! For those of you who don’t know, along with majoring in Journalism, I was a Poly Sci major too and because of this I LOVE a good debate. No, I seriously do. A bunch of you (yoga teachers included) disagreed with what I wrote while many of you (yoga teachers included) thought I was spot on. This is why I write what I write. So we can talk about things and spark debate and agree to disagree at times! No fluff pieces here because you would’t read what I had to say if so HA! I do want to add that in my last post, I was speaking entirely to those yoga students who come into class with a fixed agenda. Not those of you who are injured, recovering from an injury, or “older” (30 year olds included!) or listening to your body and need to modify and such. I was speaking of and directly to those students who have already decided that they are working on specific poses whether or not it’s in the teacher’s sequence or tradition. I just wanted and hoped to make people aware that this is happening and I think it worked! (wink, wink)
I encourage your comments always, negative or positive, because writing and talking and communicating and debating for me, is what makes life a true adventure!
I love this bunch!